The Strings and The Final Bow
by MissMoustachio
Summary: Sherlock loved to play violin and John loved to listen. A one-shot I wrote to help me cope with Reichenbach blues.


**Hello everyone! Okay, so this is my first (published) Sherlock fanfiction and I'm quite nervous! I should make it known that I do not ship Johnlock and this is not a Johnlock fic, although it's fine if you want to percieve it that way. Basically, I wrote this to cope with Reichenbach feels and I was listening to my favourite piece of classical music so it all seemed to fit together. I'll leave you to your deductions. Anyway, read and review as you see fit! xox  
I do not own Sherlock or any of its characters. All rights to their respective owners. **_  
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_It is cruel, you know, that music should be so beautiful. It has the beauty of loneliness, of pain: of strength and freedom. The beauty of disappointment and never-satisfied love. The cruel beauty of nature and everlasting beauty of monotony._

_-Benjamin Britten_

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His favourite song was Pachelbel's Canon in D Major.

I remember that clearly.

When it was early in the morning and he couldn't sleep Sherlock would take out his beloved violin and run the bow lovingly over its strings, coaxing the music out to let it dance in the air. He'd play it softly to start with, slowly increasing his volume and vigour as he gave himself up to the music.

I would lie awake at night and listen to him, enraptured. I'd imagine the bow gliding across the shining strings, making starlight and pure energy shoot from them and form fireworks in the air.

Soon I'd find myself drawn from my bed and I would be sat on the stairway, watching the consulting detective as he floated around the room, his opal skin translucent in the moonlight. He was a ghost, a mere vessel for the music to control whenever it wished. He was a slave to its serenade, nothing more and nothing less.

Finally, I would end up in the living room, curled up in my armchair as I watched him spin and sway with the rhythm. He was hypnotised, oblivious to me and oblivious to the world. It was just him and the music. He was celestial.

This enthralling circumstance happened every night for the first few months we lived together. I would sit and watch him as he played the piece on a loop. He'd play until I was deep in the recesses of sleep and when I woke up he'd be playing it still. One night, I found he wasn't playing. He was on his knees under the window, pooled by the cold white moonlight with his raven curls covering his face. The violin was in his hands and the bow was running over the strings, but it didn't touch them; instead it hovered a centimetre above them, taunting and teasing the strings but never satisfying them. He didn't look up but he knew I was there. I took up my place in the chair and folded myself into a ball, waiting for him to come out of his trance.

"Did you know a violin contains about 70 separate pieces of wood?" he whispered, startling me slightly.

"I've never really thought about it before," I replied cautiously, recovering from my shock. He gave a short, humourless laugh and brought the violin to his chin. I joined him by his side, expectant. But still he didn't play. Finally, I could take the silence no longer.

"Why have you stopped playing?" He looked at me then. His ice blue eyes were sparkling, glistening with dormant tears. Dark purple bruises stained the skin underneath his eyes and I could almost hear his heart thudding against his chest.

"Victor Hugo said that 'Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent'. I can't help you with my words John – that's not who I am – but I can help you with my music." My brow puckered slightly.

"I'm not sure I understand." He gave another laugh and looked at the ceiling.

"Ever since I started playing that piece you've not had a single nightmare. I've stopped playing because you're no longer afraid."

We sat there in silence for a moment before I enveloped him in a hug, pressing him close to me. His body was stiff and unresponsive but I could feel the smile on his face. Sobs shook my body, making me rock against him. He moved with the motion, the both of us swaying forward and backward as one.

"You're my best friend, Sherlock. No one's ever cared before, not like you. Thank you for saving me," I wept, squeezing him tight. He gave in then and wrapped his arms around me too.

"No… thank _you _for saving _me_."

* * *

We never had a moment as tender as that again and we didn't speak of that night until he was six feet under the ground and I was collapsed by his grave side. I hugged his tombstone; it was just like how he'd been, cold and unresponsive. Classic Sherlock, in life and death. But it's a curious thing; as I went to leave I could hear the faint strings of a violin playing in the distance. The music was Canon in D Major but it sounded different to what I was used to. It was drowning in sadness but hope was intertwined within the strings, letting off tiny bursts of glitter that swirled in the wind and got lifted up into the concrete sky. I smiled then. I wouldn't be having any terrors that night.

"You're my best friend, Sherlock. No one's ever cared before, not like you. Thank you for saving me." And with that I left, content that somewhere Sherlock Holmes was playing once again and, whilst he was dead, his music and his love would live on.


End file.
